Bushisms

Through twitter, I stumbled upon this documentlogorrhea. I found it so silly that I need to post something here. I am expecting trolls to wake up so comments will be closed on this post, exceptionally.

Let me revisit the 13 bullet points present in that article:

Using "guys" to mean "people"

I find this ridiculous. One just does not change a living spoken language like that. Complaining about that makes people think about it while most of them were not thinking that way, and were certainly using "guys" in a totally non-sexist way.

Using "girls" for "women"

This is again ridiculous and so US-centric. Here in France, women of all ages call themselves "les filles" and I never heard anyone complain.

"Mom" as an example of non-tech user

All W3C co-workers can testify I often quote my dad as an example of non-tech user. For two reasons: first, my mom passed away ten years ago; second, my dad is an excellent non-tech beta-tester. Anyway, I would happily use "mom" if my mom was still here AND a non-tech user. This is none of your business anyway if I want to mention my mom or my dad.

Using avatars that are male by default

Seriously? This sounds like the rant of a frustrated 10 years old kid (and I don't even know if the person who wrote the article is a woman or a man, old or young, westerner or not, I just do not care)...

Describing software or algorithms as “sexy”, “hot”, etc.

Some of my friends can testify I used to describe the beauty and the "sexyness" of some complex proofs in maths. They did the same, men or women. This is not going to change, and I find this request absolutely ridiculous and having nothing to do with sexism.

Assuming women they meet are in non-technical roles.

Here, the author has a point. Agreed.

Fetishizing “hot geek girls”

It seems to me the author of that list is fighting a war impossible to win: there will always be morons on this planet, and they will always outnumber the others. Live with it.

Denigrating things by comparing them to women or femininity

In 23 years in the software industry, I never ever heard someone do that. This is about fighting Don Quixote's windmills.

Stereotyping women’s needs… or ignoring them.

I just cannot find the right words to describe my feelings reading this, sorry.

Using dark UI patterns.

This is so wider than sexism I have no idea why it's here.

Repeating generalizations about gender essentialism.

Ah, a new concept, "gender essentialism". Lobbyists go so fast inventing new terms for their rhetoric fights these days I cannot cope. Ooops, is that generalization? So sorry...

Assuming every woman in tech feels the same way and/or wants to discuss her experiences “as a woman in tech”.

Again, 23 years in tech and I've never seen that happen.

Staying quiet when other men do these things.

I promise I will never stay quiet when bullshitisms appear on my radar, wherever they come from, including from people fighting sexism with arguments that seem to me totally wrong.

" Starting next week, travelers to the U.S. will have to either get a visa or use a US Gov't website to get advance approval. Just coming from a "visa waiver country" is no longer good enough. ".

The fun thing here is the following:

" Note that a web search of ESTA may lead you to something like "esta.us" which looks official, but is really a private company trying to charge you money for a service that (I suspect) is the same as the free government-provided service."

On another note, I read a good article yesterday saying the US should first care for their own dirty laundry instead of "bringing freedom and democracy" to the rest of the world. I must say the existence of the Madoff fraud is another extraordinary slap in the face of the whole US system. A few years ago, the CIA did nothing with urgent warning signs coming from european intelligence services. Result was 9/11. The Federal Adminitration did nothing with warnings about New Orleans' levees. Result was Katrina. SEC did nothing with Markopolos' warning signs. Result is 50B$ vanished. And apparently, Markopolos started warning about Madoff ten years ago... Are all US governmental organizations so incompetent?

European readers, another excerpt of this document is a must-read for you:

"During a 2002 marketing trip to Europe every hedge fund FOF I met with in Paris and geneva had investments with BM."

and

"The French and Swiss Private Banks are the largest investors in Bernie Madoff"

I woke up around 5am to see the results and the results came precisely 5 minutes later. At this moment, Obama has 338 votes and McCain 155, with still 4 states to go !!!! The Senate is blue and ... wow the House fell in same hands exactly a minute ago. I call that a tsunami.

Seen from the Old Continent, I have only two words to say to my american friends : thanks, congrats !

Bill Clinton spent eight years visiting the whole world to give conferences and talks, I guess George W. Bush will be only invited by DisneyWorld... And Sarah Palin can go back to moose hunting, for the sake of this planet.

Amazing to see everyone smiling and laughing on CNN, and everyone grimacing on FoxNews

<daniel> Sarah Palin claimed men and dinosaurs coexisted on an Earth created 6,000 years ago... Sigh... What a vice-pres candidate...<laurent> could someone let her know Jurassic Park is only a fiction?

I saw large parts of the first Obama-McCain debate. Let me give you the opinion of a foreigner (assuming you're an american reader):

clearly no obvious winner, perhaps a very little plus on Obama's
side that's all ; Obama caught McCain a few times with better
arguments, McCain caught Obama a few times with excellent remarks. I
even saw McCain destabilizing Obama at least twice.

McCain's brain is still working very well but he should stop making references to the army all the time

I heard nothing - just nothing - smart on the financial side

I found hearing both of them speak of tax cuts in the current context plain hilarious

I just hated the "I have that bracelet from a soldier..." series

Obama mentioned Biden once ; McCain did not mention Palin at all

McCain does not like Montana bears...

McCain's spending freeze on everything but defense and veterans made me scream

Obama did not answer clearly enough when McCain said he never had a hearing as the chair of NATO committee for Afghanistan

Globally, it was boring and I don't think it had the potential to change anybody's opinion.